


Maybe

by foxyboxes



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-01
Updated: 2016-12-01
Packaged: 2018-09-03 11:35:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,989
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8711068
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/foxyboxes/pseuds/foxyboxes
Summary: It's approaching a year since Atem passed on, and Ryou is haunted by missed opportunities.   ((written for the YGO mini-exchange as a pinch-hitting prompt))





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [patxaran](https://archiveofourown.org/users/patxaran/gifts).



> ((This is my first time writing canon YGO. I hope you enjoy it, patxaran!))
> 
> PROMPT 4 - Once Atem’s memories are restored, Ryou, the utter nerd, realizes he can totally ask Atem how to play ancient games like mehen and senet. The only problem is, Ryou keeps forgetting to ask. Even as he mistakenly uses a mehen board replica for a trivet while Yuugi et all are over for dinner, the question completely slips his mind until well after Atem has already left. This sort of thing escalates until everyone (minus one!) is literally leaving the tomb after the ceremonial duel, and Ryou stops dead, horrified, like “oh shiiiiiit”. And then, perhaps more than even Yami Bakura, THIS is the one thing about his teenage years that haunts Ryou the most for the rest of his nerdy life.

 

 

 

“And school is going well?  No incidents this year, I hope…”  
  
“No, none at all!” Ryou assured, one pale hand unconsciously reaching up to brush the divots of scar tissue that lurked beneath his shirt - a permanent reminder of the“incidents” in question.   “Actually, this year I’ve signed up for a botany class with Yuugi and Anzu, and we’re--”   
  
The connection hiccuped, giving him pause.  “Dad?  Are you losing reception again?”   
  
“I’ve got another call, Ryou, give me just a minute.”      
  
“Ah, sure.”  he smiled to the empty bedroom, hearing everything go silent on the other end of the phone call as he slouched back in his computer chair.    It was, most likely, a member of the expedition calling him away to assist with some breaking development, which meant the conversation was effectively over.   Better luck next week.     
  
The smile dissolved away as he cast a look at the nearby clock on the wall, finding that barely ten minutes had passed since he’d sat down.  There was little sense in being annoyed with his father for doing well at his job, and yet--   
  
“Son, I apologize, but I’m going to need to let you go.  There’s been some important findings.”   
  
“Oh, is that so?”   The smile was back, returning the saccharine flavor to his voice’s tone.   “You’ll tell me about what you found later, right?”   
  
“I’ll send you an Email before bed, how does that sound?”     
  
“I’ll look forward to it.”     
  
“Have a good night, Ryou.   Tell your friends hello for me.”     
  
“I will, bye!”      
  
There was likely not to be an Email, of course….his father had told him once during one of their calls that when there were “important findings”, sometimes he forewent sleep for days at a time in order to give them proper attention.     
  
If only HE had findings important enough to command that sort of attention…   
  
As the thought ghosted across his mind, an ugly snarl of emotion rifled through his stomach.  He _had_ , though.   He’d been directly in the center of an entirely forgotten chapter of ancient Egyptian history, and he’d, when all was said and done, ended up with nothing to show for it.   
  
Nothing but the scars, of course….and his own regrets.  


_He had paused at the top of the crumbling stairs and chanced a look over his shoulder while the others had scrambled past him to safety.   He wasn’t sure what he’d expected to see, having watched Atem cross the threshold into eternity just moments before, and yet all the same he hoped there might be something.    Some residual wisp or presence to indicate that the Pharaoh had left even a small part of himself behind in their world.   How could he not when it was here that he’d regained both substance and humanity?  It was..._ **_sensible_ ** _, wasn’t it?_   
  
_“Bakura, hurry!  The whole thing’s coming down!”  Yuugi’s voice had interrupted his desperate train of thought as Honda had seized him by the shoulder and hauled from the collapsing tomb into the blaring desert sun.    There they had stood, watching it all dissolve to dust, and everyone wishing they could have done just a bit more.  Ryou, perhaps, more than the rest…_  
  
He jarred himself out of the daydream, the collapse of old foundations and the sighing of disturbed sands still ringing in his ears.      


He’d often entertained the idea, after returning home, that he’d do things much differently if he were handed that piece of his life to relive.   Maybe he would not remain so distanced from the spirit of the ring...maybe would have demanded answers from it instead.  Who it was, why it was, what it hoped to accomplish with its revenge, and why it had chosen him as a vessel to do so.    Maybe it could have been reasoned with...  
  
Maybe there would have been no reason for Yuugi and the others to keep him at arm’s length, always on the edge of the loop but never inside of it as they’d helped Atem rediscover himself and cleared the path toward his hereafter.    Maybe he, too, would have been allowed to journey into the world of the Pharaoh’s memories and witnessed whatever they held so that he could return with accuracies to replace the hypotheses that filled ancient history’s gaps..   


Maybe…  
  
Ryou had no sooner moved to place the phone back on its charger than it chirped in his hand, lighting up with a new text notification.   
  
**Yuugi:**  Hey, you aren’t answering your Skype.  You around?   
  
Ryou blinked at the hovering text before swiping his thumb over the lock screen to reply.   
  
**You:**   Hi!  Sorry, I’m here. Had a phone call.   
  
**Yuugi:**  Ah okay.  I just wanted to give you a heads- up:  Anzu just got word that the teacher decided not to give our class that week extension on the lab project after all.   
  
**You:**  Oh really? :(  Well, I wouldn’t worry.  She said she won’t take points off if our plants aren’t in bloom.   
  
As he led himself down his path of regrets about the whole mess yet again, Ryou’s eyes fell on the flat, grooved spiral sitting atop his game table amid a litter of miniatures and scenery.   He’d remembered feverishly reading up on what little information there was to be had about mehen while carefully hand-making his own replica of the board as he’d planned a dinner date, knowing that Yuugi’s love of games he hadn’t yet played would almost assuredly result in the Pharaoh being coaxed to explain the long-forgotten rules and the three of them settling in to play it      
  
It _ought_ to have happened like that, but it hadn’t.   All during dinner, Ryou had found himself on-edge and distracted as the spirit hissed and thrashed just below his surface, incensed by the Puzzle being so closeby.  It wasn’t until Yuugi had alerted him to the smell of burning paint, making him realize that he’d absent-mindedly placed a hot kettle atop his mehen board, that he’d realized what a mess the whole get-together was shaping up to be.   Apologizing profusely to his unsettled guests, dinner had been quickly wrapped up as everyone had gone on their way, leaving Ryou to clean up the aftermath.     
  
At the time, the fact his plans had been derailed hadn’t bothered him terribly as he had reasoned there would be other chances.  But now...here he was.  No more chances, no insight to anything new or groundbreaking.      
  
As he reached out, running his fingers over the blistered paint job, his phone buzzed in his hand again, dragging his attention back to the present.   
  
**Yuugi:**  Mind if I call?   
  
The teen chewed his lip, the pad of his thumb beginning to tick out a polite refusal before he quickly second-guessed and deleted it.   
  
**You:**   Sure!   
  
Not a minute later, the first few notes of the shortlived Monster World television series’ theme song emitted from his phone’s speaker as Ryou punched the ‘accept call’ button.   
  
“Sorry, I thought this would be easier than typing at each other.  Am I taking you away from anything important?”   
  
“Ah no, just cleaning up a bit.” he smiled, taking up the mehen board and dropping it in the nearby wastepaper bin.   “You’re not worried about our project, are you?”   
  
“What?  No way!  We’ve got one of the best plants in class!” Yugi insisted.   “I was just…”   he trailed off, making Ryou’s pale brows raise.   
  
“Yuugi…?”   
  
“I was just thinking about some stuff, that’s all.” he finished at last, huffing a sigh.    “It’s going to be a year next Tuesday, you know?”   
  
_I know.  No one knows more than I do._   
  
“Already?”  Ryou asked.  “I’ve tried not to think too much about it...it was all so crazy….not to mention I wasn’t myself a lot of the time.”   
  
“Right.  The spirit.    I don’t think I ever really apologized for staying distant from you during all of that...it wasn’t your fault.”   
  
_Then why didn’t you do more to help me?_   
  
“No hard feelings, I’m glad you kept yourselves safe.   I just wish I’d had more control over it all.”   
  
There was a muffled noise on the other end of the connection that sounded rather like Yuugi had just flopped himself onto a couch or his bed.      
  
“I know Atem’s moved on and all, but…I really miss him sometimes.”   Yuugi admitted.  “If I just hadn’t won that last duel--”   
  
“I miss him too.”  Ryou heard himself say, knowing it was a mistake even before Yuugi’s lament petered out into confused silence.     
  
“Really?  I didn’t think the two of you ever talked all that much.”   
  
“Well....with things being what they were, there was never a good time.  It doesn’t mean I wouldn’t have wanted to get to know him better.”   
  
“I guess that’s true…maybe we all have some regrets where he’s concerned.”   
  
“I suppose…”  Ryou’s hand drifted to a miniature he’d painted in the spirit’s likeness, lurking among the others he’d painted up like him and his friends.  He turned it over in his fingers, and then dropped it into the bin as well.    “He could have taught me a lot.”   
  
“Yeah?”   
  
“How to play a few games, anyway.”  Ryou relented with a chuckle he didn’t quite feel.   “Maybe I could have shared them with my dad.  Get him to stay for an entire phone call for once.”     
  
“He’s on another expedition _already_ ?”     
  
“I don’t think his last one ever ended…”     
  
A brief, uncomfortable silence spanned between the two teens before Yuugi cleared his throat.      
  
“Hey, Burger World’s open for another couple of hours.  Feel like meeting up with me for shakes?”   
  
“Ah?”  Ryou blinked in surprise, not used to Yuugi extending the invitation to spend time with him one-on-one...even after everything had settled, he was usually only invited along outside of school if Anzu, Jou, and Honda were also going.   
  
“It sounds like we both have a lot on our minds.  Maybe getting out for awhile would help.”   
  
“Maybe…” he murmured thoughtfully, eyes flicking in the direction of his dormant computer monitor and wondering if the night’s odd events might cap themselves off by an Email from his father waiting for him after all.     “I still have some homework to finish, but…”   
  
“You could bring it with you!”  Yuugi suggested in that bright tone of voice that Ryou had always found he had trouble arguing with...the same one that had wheedled at him to befriend the lot of them despite his worries they would end up comatose like the others .   “And, I know it’s not quite the same thing, but I could show you one of the games Atem taught me before he left.   Have you ever heard of one called mehen?”   
  
Ryou slowly drew the phone away from his ear and stared at it as if it had suddenly become a strange alien artifact.   
  
“Ryou?  Hey, Ryou!  Are you still there?”   
  
“Y-Yes, I just…”     He wasn’t sure how he ought to feel about this latest turn of events, or if there even was an appropriate reaction to be had.   At length, he chuffed out an exasperated laugh.     “Nevermind, I’ll get my jacket.  See you in a bit!”   
  
“Right!”     
  
He hung up without further ado, pocketing his phone and grabbing his hooded sweatshirt off of the back of his chair.    As he struggled into it and started for the door, he paused, casting a thoughtful look back at the trash bin before reaching inside to fetch the discarded mehen board.   It wasn’t the condition he had hoped to present his project in, certainly...the melted paint and cracked plaster of paris made his hours of hard work and hopes look rather twisted and sorry.   Something unworthy of presenting to a Pharaoh.   
  
It was almost poetic, really...   
  
Hitching up the corner of his mouth in a lopsided smirk, he tucked the board into the crook of his arm and ventured out of his apartment into the chilled evening air.


End file.
